Wild giant pandas face tough winter: experts

Source: Xinhua  |   2008-11-9  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

THERE may be more sick giant pandas in the wild this winter after the Sichuan earthquake wrecked the famed animals' habitat and caused food shortages, experts said yesterday.

"It will be a great challenge for panda research and breeding centers to take in more wild pandas," said Zhang Guiquan, assistant director of the Wolong Nature Reserve Administration.

Wild giant pandas, which live at altitudes from 2,500 to 3,200 meters, usually go to lower-altitude regions to look for food when their staple diet, bamboo, is covered by snow.

Some of the pandas will "ask local residents for help" if they are really starved or ill, Zhang warned.

The assistant director said usually four to five wild pandas are found in the Sichuan Province each winter from December to March.

"They have come down from the mountains so early this year and that's why we predict it will be a worse situation for the wild pandas this winter," Zhang said, adding that the main reason was food shortage.

In late October, two wild pandas were found by local farmers, one in Wolong and the other in Qingchuan County, both areas greatly affected in the 8.0-magnitude earthquake which jolted southwest China's Sichuan Province on May 12.

One of the pandas has been moved for further treatment to the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda (CCRCGP) in Ya'an City, which was less affected by the quake.

Most of the wild pandas, when found by residents, suffered from nutrition deficiencies and anaemia and some of them had other diseases, said Tang Chunxiang, chief vet of the CCRCGP, which also accepted 53 pandas living in captivity from the Wolong Nature Reserve.

"Some of them may carry unknown bacteria or have infectious diseases, which will endanger the pandas in captivity," Tang said. "So we have to provide them with single rooms to separate them from our own pandas."

The center has a lot of pandas now as 13 cubs have been born since the earthquake.